Is there a program you can use to cross check these combinations to make sure that the combination you are playing does not match more than 3 numbers in the previous drawings.

The 338 combinations I referred to are the drawings since the MegaMillions last matrix change. MegaMillions has had 662 drawings since its name changed from BigGame. If I include those BG drawings also then there are 1182 drawings starting back at 09/06/1996.

I can load up to 1800 previous drawings in my RNG memory and it will check each combination picked against all those drawings. Right now I'm limiting my MM picks to matching 3 no more than than two times during the last 338 drawings and to no more than 12 times since the game begin in 1996.

As more drawings are added those limits will change so I always compare the previous drawings against each other before picking combinations for the up coming drawings.

Our PB pool picked up $11 tonight on two 1+1's, and a 0+1. Picked 32 WB numbers, and only had 1 of 5. Oy. Managed to sneak the PB number in there though. I would consider switching PB WB's to a middle-ranked group, but top/bottom have much higher percentage unlike MM, which appears to have a higher percentage of middle-ranked numbers. I'll be doing some further analysis before Saturday for sure.

Scratch my picks for Friday that I posted yesterday. That was a little preemptive. I modified the software so choosing ranges won't be manual now. The software takes the pool size of your choice (using 300), and loops through the back check making note of where all numbers were ranked that hit. Then we choose the top 36 ranking spots, and pick numbers from those ranks for the next drawing. We are using this method for Powerball (back checking shows very positive results), and we'll go with the following picks for Mega Millions this Friday. We are still choosing the top 20 MB numbers ranked by 'due', with a pool size of 338.

*I probably won't use all the numbers just the ones in the first 20 lines.

Getting started earlier this time gave me a chance to run my RNG several times and change how the parameters were used. For example, the first runs required that all numbers picked had hit in their position before and later runs only required the numbers be in the range of numbers hit in that position before. Since I used the same seed number (419/my birth date) for every run, the first 5 combinations in all the runs were the same but changed as more lines were created. I opted to use the last run since it included all the numbers in the pool. I saved all the runs and will check them after tonight's drawing.

Sounds like your PowerBall strategy is working. 21 numbers should give you a pretty good chance at hitting the PB.

Picking the top 15-20 megaball numbers and adding the megaball numbers that are in the top 10 repeating positions seem to be working for me as long as I'm playing 20 lines.

I need to work on getting 5 of the regular numbers in a smaller group even if some of those numbers aren't in the group every time. For example when I've looked at the previous 25 drawings of each MM drawing since the matrix change and picked the numbers that hit 1-2 times I got a pool of 25-36 numbers that had 3 or more of the 5 winning numbers 51.6% of the time. I'll be looking for a definition that defines a group that have an even higher percent of the winning numbers.

Intersesting ideas there RJ. What do you use to decide when you say "Picking the top 15-20 megaball numbers"?

I assume you mean by "top 10 repeating positions" you are talking about what you mentioned a while ago, where 11 draws between repeats is the most common? Then take the top 10 most common amounts of draws between repeats, and play balls that would be due under that theory..

I started to work an idea like your last one into my PB stratgy, but never completed that portion of the app. I have it setup for reporting at least now..

Here is how it looks for PB and MM for recent draws, looking back 25 draws from the current one being evaluated. The numbers in the 5 right colums are a sum of how many times that ball (in respective order in the results column) has hit in the past 25, but in this chart it includes the current drawing so a value of 2 here means it has hit 1 other time in the past 25. A 3 means this is the 3rd time that ball hit in the past 25, etc.

Powerball:

9/20/2008

6,28,30,40,47

2

4

1

4

5

9/17/2008

12,23,26,32,44

3

3

3

4

2

9/13/2008

7,17,29,43,51

3

2

2

3

4

9/10/2008

14,15,28,37,53

5

4

3

2

5

9/6/2008

17,25,26,49,54

1

3

2

5

2

9/3/2008

38,40,46,49,50

1

3

3

5

4

8/30/2008

2,14,15,32,47

3

4

3

3

4

8/27/2008

13,31,36,48,49

2

6

2

5

4

8/23/2008

18,24,33,47,48

3

4

3

3

4

8/20/2008

15,16,24,35,47

2

1

3

2

2

8/16/2008

5,34,40,43,52

6

4

4

2

6

8/13/2008

5,10,19,23,31

5

2

1

2

5

8/9/2008

32,40,43,49,53

2

3

2

3

4

8/6/2008

5,24,36,37,51

4

2

1

2

4

8/2/2008

2,5,28,33,54

2

3

3

4

1

7/30/2008

3,25,45,51,55

3

4

4

3

3

7/26/2008

12,13,21,51,55

5

1

6

2

2

7/23/2008

11,14,35,41,52

2

5

1

3

5

7/19/2008

6,28,46,53,55

1

4

4

3

1

7/16/2008

3,15,23,29,42

2

2

1

2

4

7/12/2008

2,12,20,22,50

2

5

4

3

3

7/9/2008

5,7,31,49,53

2

6

4

2

2

7/5/2008

1,24,34,47,48

2

2

3

1

4

7/2/2008

4,33,46,48,52

1

4

4

3

5

Mega Millions:

9/19/2008

2,9,41,48,51

4

4

3

1

5

9/16/2008

13,24,39,51,52

4

3

3

4

4

9/12/2008

1,12,14,25,35

5

3

4

3

2

9/9/2008

22,23,28,49,52

5

5

2

2

3

9/5/2008

1,6,15,27,46

4

2

2

1

1

9/2/2008

14,23,43,44,54

5

4

3

2

1

8/29/2008

21,25,26,50,51

2

3

2

4

4

8/26/2008

6,16,24,34,36

1

4

3

2

5

8/22/2008

12,13,15,41,42

2

3

2

2

3

8/19/2008

9,18,19,26,40

5

2

5

1

3

8/15/2008

8,23,29,30,53

5

3

4

3

4

8/12/2008

2,7,23,38,40

4

1

2

3

2

8/8/2008

11,17,28,32,50

5

4

1

5

3

8/5/2008

9,21,36,38,55

4

1

4

2

3

8/1/2008

9,13,17,18,56

3

2

3

1

2

7/29/2008

11,13,20,30,42

4

1

4

2

2

7/25/2008

2,16,19,35,52

3

4

4

1

2

7/22/2008

2,16,23,29,32

2

3

1

3

4

7/18/2008

17,29,36,53,55

2

2

3

5

3

7/15/2008

19,24,34,45,51

5

5

1

3

4

7/11/2008

5,14,16,39,51

3

6

2

4

3

7/8/2008

1,20,22,29,41

3

3

6

1

2

7/4/2008

1,3,12,19,20

2

3

2

4

2

7/1/2008

1,22,33,43,52

1

5

1

4

2

Here are the current charts for how many times each ball has hit in the past 25 drawings.

Powerball:

Ball: 49

5

Ball: 47

5

Ball: 5

5

Ball: 51

4

Ball: 15

4

Ball: 24

4

Ball: 48

4

Ball: 53

4

Ball: 40

4

Ball: 28

4

Ball: 2

3

Ball: 43

3

Ball: 12

3

Ball: 46

3

Ball: 52

3

Ball: 55

3

Ball: 23

3

Ball: 32

3

Ball: 31

3

Ball: 33

3

Ball: 14

3

Ball: 6

2

Ball: 7

2

Ball: 17

2

Ball: 25

2

Ball: 13

2

Ball: 3

2

Ball: 26

2

Ball: 29

2

Ball: 50

2

Ball: 37

2

Ball: 34

2

Ball: 35

2

Ball: 36

2

Ball: 54

2

Ball: 22

1

Ball: 21

1

Ball: 30

1

Ball: 19

1

Ball: 18

1

Ball: 20

1

Ball: 38

1

Ball: 42

1

Ball: 11

1

Ball: 10

1

Ball: 16

1

Ball: 4

1

Ball: 44

1

Ball: 1

1

Ball: 45

1

Ball: 41

1

Ball: 39

0

Ball: 8

0

Ball: 9

0

Ball: 27

0

Mega Millions:

Ball: 23

5

Ball: 51

5

Ball: 1

5

Ball: 52

4

Ball: 9

4

Ball: 13

4

Ball: 19

4

Ball: 2

4

Ball: 16

4

Ball: 29

4

Ball: 14

3

Ball: 12

3

Ball: 20

3

Ball: 17

3

Ball: 22

3

Ball: 24

3

Ball: 36

3

Ball: 41

3

Ball: 18

2

Ball: 28

2

Ball: 15

2

Ball: 6

2

Ball: 38

2

Ball: 32

2

Ball: 25

2

Ball: 26

2

Ball: 21

2

Ball: 11

2

Ball: 53

2

Ball: 30

2

Ball: 50

2

Ball: 42

2

Ball: 39

2

Ball: 34

2

Ball: 35

2

Ball: 43

2

Ball: 40

2

Ball: 55

2

Ball: 45

1

Ball: 46

1

Ball: 44

1

Ball: 49

1

Ball: 33

1

Ball: 54

1

Ball: 27

1

Ball: 5

1

Ball: 8

1

Ball: 7

1

Ball: 3

1

Ball: 48

1

Ball: 4

0

Ball: 31

0

Ball: 47

0

Ball: 10

0

Ball: 37

0

Going to have to look into this further. RJ, keep me posted if you see anything out of the ordinary, and I'll do the same. I am also trying to get our 5 number selection out of a smaller group (20-25 would be nice for now). We would still play roughly the same amount of tickets, but have a much better chance at getting big hits assuming we can nail those groups correctly.

The distribution I use is basically random where most balls are seen 3 times, and a few are only seen twice (no reason there except that it fits all 36 in 20 tickets). MB numbers are just laid out straight down the picks.

When you checked the the previous 25 drawings for 09/19/08 you showed 48 had hit once during those drawings and my program showed 0 and the other numbers were one less than you showed. When 48 hit on 09/19/08, that was the first time it hit since 04/22/08 which was 43 drawings earlier.You must have counted the actually drawings in your tally.

My calculations in the lower portion should be *including* the 9/19 drawing, but I will double check all those numbers.

The calculations in the upper part of my post [should] show the current number of hits, i.e. if 48 hit it would show a 1, meaning that was the first time it hit. A number showing a 2 means that is the 2nd time it hit in the previous 25, etc. I might change that printout...

Your figures are right if you were saying when 48 hit on 9/19, it was the first time in at least 25 drawings that it hit. I was thinking the numbers of times it had hit in the last 25 drawings before 9/19. We were working with different definitions.

That happens quite often, for example one time I was talking about gaps I was saying if a combination had two numbers adjacent to each other like 48 and 49 there was a gap of 1 between them and someone else said there were no gap between 48 and 49 because they were next to each other. Then someone else said a gap is the numbers of drawings between when a number hits, like 48 in the 9/19 drawing would have a gap of 43 since it last hit on 4/22.

I guess before discussing systems, one needs to make sure everyone is using similar definitions.